Posted on 01/15/2002 7:28:29 AM PST by Valin
Edited on 09/03/2002 4:49:50 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
Mormons to Let the Games Reign Olympics: Church has lowered its profile, but Utah 'theocracy' will be seen and felt nonetheless. SALT LAKE CITY -- When the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics unfold next month, the world will see the Mormon Tabernacle Choir starring at the Opening Ceremony, the Mormon Temple soaring above the nightly medal presentation, and a Mormon bishop, the Games' affable organizer, welcoming athletes and guests from all over the globe. The XIX Winter Olympics will be a showcase for both Salt Lake City and the institution that dominates the city: the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as the Mormons are formally known.
(Excerpt) Read more at hughhewitt.com ...
I caught this a Hugh Hewitt last night.
Really? Did something about the Angel Moroni and the magic spectacles strike you as fishy? </sarcasm>
Why should there be a conflict? After all, the primary interest in both organizations is $$$$$$.
Like you I also have a problems with Mormon thelogy(but that's a subject for another thread), but a Theocracy(?), give me a break!
If I were a member of the LDSs I'd be hammering the LA slimes big time.
They believe that salvation is won by works.
They believe that "As man is God was and as God is man shall become".
They reason for their very large genealogical data base is because they believe that they can pray a dead ancestor into heaven.
Any one of the above differences classifies LDS as a cult.
And then a mere two minutes later and with nobody else posting,
Why should there be a conflict? After all, the primary interest in both organizations is $$$$$$.
LOL! I knew you'd be one of the first to show up on a thread with Mormon in the title. Could only hold out from your first "sit this one out" statement for two short minutes? ROTFL!!!
P.S. I hope you're not offended if I tell you that in your freeper photo album picture you look just like a Mormon Bishop. ;^)
Oh - the old Urim & Thummim bash - how tired and trite.
I guess that you also thought God's use of Aaron's walking stick was kinda weird too. Oh - and it turned into a snake too - ewwww. How weird! How strange! It must be occult or something.
Aaron had Urim & Thummim in the Old Testament and a tool for determining God's intent. The U & T were talked about a number of times in the Old Testament. Do you reject the Old Testament? Were Aaron and Jacob not prophets because they did something that you might consider occult?
Ex. 28: 30 (Lev. 8: 8) put in the breastplate of judgment the Urim and the Thummim.
Num. 27: 21 ask counsel for him after the judgment of Urim.
Deut. 33: 8 Let thy Thummim and thy Urim be with thy holy one.
1 Sam. 28: 6 Lord answered him not, neither by . . . Urim, nor by prophets.
Ezra 2: 63 (Neh. 7: 65) stood up a priest with Urim and with Thummim.
If you're looking for sensationalist evidence of what you probably think is occult - I guess you need look no further than the Bible:
Aaron's rod. Among other things, this rod turned into a serpent and consumed the rods of the Egyptian priests (Exodus 7:8-12; see also Exodus 7:17-21).* Jacob's rods. Jacob used his rods to cause Laban's flocks to produce spotted offspring after merely looking at the rods (Genesis 30:37-39).
* Hebrew wives accused of adultery by their husbands were tested by a rather peculiar ordeal if the husband had no witnesses. The ordeal appears to have involved magic. Mary Chilton Callaway explains:
. . . if a husband suspected his wife of adultery but had no witness, and "if the spirit of jealousy came upon him," he could bring her to the priest, who would test her by an ordeal (Numbers 5:11-31). The ordeal relied on magic. If the woman was guilty, her thigh would be made to swell by a potion she was given to drink. (201)
I can only imagine what anti-LDS critics would be saying if Joseph Smith had devised such a test for Mormon women similarly accused of adultery!
* The Urim and Thummim, a device that was worn by the chief priest to determine God's responses to yes or no questions asked by the leader of the people.
* Joseph of Egypt's silver cup, "whereby indeed he divineth" (Genesis 44:2-5). The use of cups for divination was in regular use among Joseph's pagan neighbors.
* Jesus healed a deaf man by putting his fingers into the man's ears and by spitting on a finger and touching the man's tongue with it (Mark 7:33-35). He healed a blind man by touching the man's eyes with spittle mixed with clay from the ground (John 9:6-7). Pagan healers in the ancient world also put their fingers in the ears to heal the deaf, and used spittle to heal the blind (Quinn 4).
* When it came time for the apostles to choose Judas's successor, "they cast lots . . . and the lot fell on Matthias" (Acts 1:26, Revised Standard Version). The casting of lots to discern divine will had long been a pagan custom in the ancient Near East.
Oh, and don't even let me get started on how many times Angels have borne God's messages to his people throughout the Bible.
It must be a sad and pitiful existence to believe that God no longer speaks to us and that all that is to be said has been said. To reject the Biblical precedence of God's prophets using the tools that God provides them so that you can tear down another's faith betrays any shred of true Christianity you pretend to possess.
Where did I pretend to possess a shred of Christianity?
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